Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister asked for a moderate approach towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict regarding a French peace initiative. He said that this will only encourage the Palestinians to avoid compromise.
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius propose for an international peace conference which showed the Western frustration because of the absence of movement toward a double-state solution since the failure of the US negotiation in2014. Such move would raise concern on Israel that other European countries might follow the move as reported by YNET News.
Netanyahu said in public that he did not directly reject the notion of an international conference. He added that if Frances peace effort will not succeed, it will make the Palestinian government uncompromised. Israel is ready for any negotiations without preconditions and dictated terms.
Mahmoud Abbas, Palestine's president, said that they welcome the French proposal and said that the status quo cannot continue. But Washington warned the French government that they prefer Israel and Palestine reach an agreement on final status through direct talks. Although the French government recognizes the struggle of the initiative to start, they said that Paris has a responsibility to act now for the Israeli settlement while the United States will focus on the presidential elections this November.
For the recent weeks, the United States and the European Union- Israel's closest allies have been criticizing Netanyahu's right wing government. They criticized about the settlements of 550,000 Jews who lived in 250 scattered communities across the West bank and East Jerusalem, which the Palestine's might think that the world powers might finally support UNs resolution condemning Israel's policy right.
Fueled by tensions over the halted peace talks, Palestinian attack have killed 26 Israelis and US citizens. In return Israeli forces have killed 152 Palestinians with 98 considered as assailants and most of them died due to violent protest. The Palestine's have been looking on a state in Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem, which have been occupied by Israeli since 1967 Middle East War.
Palestine is a non-member of the United Nations. Sweden is the first EU member nation that recognized Palestine as a state in 2014.
